For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. - Jeremiah 29:11
We admire that, some people have the skills of restoration. Something that is old and useless will be restored to its original beauty. For example some people have this wonderful skill of restoration with furniture. You can take some old piece of furniture to give coats of paint and varnish and get it down to its original beautiful wood and you're able to restore it to its original beauty. I admire it. Some of you also have the skill of restoring old cars and you may restore the interior, the exterior, the engine and you may make it beautiful. I just admire that kind of work.
God is also into the business of restoration. God is very gifted at it. We're not talking furniture and cars and artwork. We will talk about the skill of the restoration of people. God knows how to restore people.
The definition of restoration Webster defines like this: a) a bringing back to a former position or condition or b) an improved condition.
The word restore, restoration is used often in the Bible. In a BIBLICAL SENSE: a) when God leads people back to him who are estranged or distant from Him. b) When God forgives sin and gives hope. This is what God does with us. He restores us. He takes our old lives as sinful lives, and he restores us into the right relationship with him; and He gives us a new life. How many of you are thankful for restoration in your lives? Amen.
This is what God does. Jeremiah chapter 29 is a chapter of restoration. God promises to restore the Jewish people who have sinned against him and rebelled against him. And it's a good template for us to be reminded about God's restoring work in our own lives. Jeremiah 29:10-14 is one of the most familiar passages of scripture in the whole book of Jeremiah. What we find out here is that chapter 29 is actually a letter. The first few verses tell us that God basically inspired Jeremiah to pen a letter and to write this letter to the exiles, Jewish people who have now been taken captive and deported a thousand miles away from Jerusalem to Babylon which is where they're living now.
Here’s the historical background. In the year 606 BC King Nebuchadnezzar began sieging Judah. Judah was the lower portion of the nation of Israel, it was the kingdom of southern Judah, by the way the people of Judah were so named after the tribe of Judah. The term Jew does not appear to describe the Israelites until this time period. From the Babylonian captivity the people will then forever and even today be known as Jews. The Jews have now been deported to Babylon by the tens of thousands over the period of 20 years from 606 BC to 586 BC. Nebuchadnezzar will come against Judah and bring the country down and eventually overtake the city of Jerusalem. In the process of those 20 years he will deport tens of thousands of Jews to Babylon; they will be uprooted from their country; they will be forcibly removed from their homes. They will be separated from their families and many of them, most of them, will never again return to their homeland.
God loved his people though they worshiped false gods and did wrong. He said I cannot allow you to remain on this wicked path forsaking me, rebelling against me. Therefore, He uses the Babylonian Empire as the rod of his discipline. Three times in the Book of Jeremiah, God calls Nebuchadnezzar, this pagan king, my servant Nebuchadnezzar. In the hand of God, Nebuchadnezzar becomes the instrument that God used to correct the people that God loves, his own Jewish people.
God in this whole story is that his mercy is demonstrated on the front end and on the back end. They didn't have to go to Babylon, they didn't have to be carried off as captives if they had turned back to God and that's the reason why God sent prophet after prophet warning them in advance. So God's mercy was on the front end. God was saying over and over again through the prophets if you'll turn to me the Babylonians won't come. If you turn to me, they don't need to come. If you don't turn to me, they're coming. So his mercy was there, but they didn't heed his warning. They rejected the word of the Prophet, they rejected God and so the Babylonians came and hauled them off to captivity where they spent seventy years. But the beauty of God is not only his mercy in the front end, but his mercy is evident in the back end of this story. Because even after 70 years God displays his mercy to them by bringing them back and restoring them. And this is what he does here in chapter 29.
This whole story is important to us because we need God's mercy too and there have been times we've sinned against the Lord on the front end of his mercy and I'm so thankful that there's still mercy on the back end. This is the way God deals with us. Jeremiah takes this letter that says the plans He has for them, the hope He has for the future that is in store for them. He wants them to know He has not given up on them because He still loves them because He is the God of restoration. In chapter 29 I'm going to break down with you verses 10 to 14. The first one is what God thinks about us.
1) God Thinks About Us (29:10-11a)
10 This is what the Lord says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back to this place. 11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord. - Jeremiah 29:10-11a (NIV)
For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord. It literally translates for I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord. The people of God have rebelled against him. They've been obstinate and sinful. They are now in Babylon and God still wants them to know that He hasn’t forgotten about them. I think about you, all the time; I think about you, I know the thoughts that I think towards you. It is good to know that though the Jews had sinned against God He was still thinking about them. He had not forsaken them even though they had been banished from the land of Judah, sent over to Babylon. They had not been banished from the heart and mind of God. God still loved them, thought about them, and had a plan for them; He's concerned about them.
Dear brothers, sisters in Christ, listen: you are here today, and you might feel far from God because you've sinned against him, and you know you're not right with God, you know you're not in a good place with God, but I just want you to know that you're heavy on His heart and mind. He still thinks about you. He has thoughts toward you. You were near and dear to the heart of God. God never loves our sin, but he still loves us. And He separates what we do from who we are. He loves us enough that he won't abandon us. He sticks closer than a brother. He will never leave us nor forsake us. Of course His heart is broken when we sin. Of course He's grieved over it as he was for his own children that he himself intentionally sent to Babylon as a part of disciplining them and purging them of idolatry and bringing them to a place of greater surrender, but he never forgot about them. And He never forgets about us, because we're still near and dear to his heart and mind.
In Psalm 139:17-18 the psalmist says, How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand; When I awake, I am still with You.
How precious to me are your thoughts, O God. The psalmist is not saying that He knows the thoughts of God. So in reality if you look at the original Hebrew in the preposition TO when he says here your thoughts are precious to me. It literally translates how precious FOR me are your thoughts. How precious concerning me are your thoughts that the psalmist is amazed that in all the vastness of the universe God would stop to think about every single one of us. We are near and dear to the heart and thought of God. In fact David would write in Psalm 8:4 What is man that you are mindful of us, the son of man that you care about him. David is blown away by the thought that God would think about us in all the vastness of the universe. God actually thinks about you and me specifically. God thinks about us as part of his restoration toward us.
2) God is for us (26:11b)
We also see here in this passage that God is for us. For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope, and a Future. Jeremiah 29:11b.
This is a great verse. The word prosper means, some people instantly think, God wants to make everybody rich and that's not what this means. God wants everybody to know the plans, the plans I have to prosper you. The word prosper is, in the original Hebrew “Shalom”. God wants his overarching peace for your life, but he's not promising you a new car, new house, or material things. What he's saying here is I want for you a peace that passes all understanding, I want you to have my overwhelming goodness and favor expressed to you through my Shalom, my peace in your life. His peace Jesus would say in John 14:27, Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. My peace I have given to you is not as the world given to you. My peace is different from what the world offers. That's why Jesus said, ``Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. God says this is what I have in store for you, my peace.
Now it's important that the exiles knew this. I want you to understand my wholeness and my goodness towards you. I don't intend to harm you. He said I don't attempt to harm. That's the other part of this passage; no harm is intended. There's a difference between punishment and discipline. God disciplines those whom He loves. The writer of Hebrews says that no discipline seems Pleasant at the time, only painful. - Hebrews 12:11. It produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. So when we come through the discipline of God, we can experience a greater measure of this peace. No harm intended; this is God's peace.
He says secondly ‘a hope of the future’. This is how it translates for us over in Babylon, a thousand miles away from our homeland, from our families, our children. They've been isolated in different parts of Babylon.
The truth of the matter is even though you have been in a bad place, God is with you, and He is for you. When God says here, I have a hope in a future for you, what he's saying to us is there's a future after failure. God doesn't write people off, God doesn't write anybody off. The promise for a hope of the future is for anyone. There's a hope and a future for us regardless of what we might have done. There's a future after failure. Look at the life of Peter, and David. It was hurtful for them when they had to go through it. But God was gracious and merciful to them. There was a future after failure. That's what God is saying here. I give you hope in the future. Punishment won't last forever. God has a purpose, a plan in His mind & a heart for you.
3) God is Near us: (29:12-14)
Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. 13 And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back from your captivity; I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be carried away captive. Jeremiah 29:12-14.
The invitation that God gives to them says if you call upon me, if you pray to me, if you come to me, if you seek me, you'll find me. You'll find me. It's so true that God is only a prayer away. He is near to us. He's only a prayer away. Again, this is a good reminder because it's easy. Sometimes our sin keeps us a great distance from God. Sin creates the distance, but God is only a prayer away and that distance can be bridged through Christ. When we come and we ask for forgiveness God is near to us. He's standing ready to receive us with open arms because God is a God of restoration. He is near to us and all we need to do is call upon him and seek him with all our heart and he will be found by us.
4) God wants from us REPENTANCE and RESPONSIBILITY: (31:18-19)
Great! God thinks about me, God has a plan for me, God is near to me, but how can I really experience restoration? God says two things; they are repentance and responsibility. He wants us to repent. Repent means that you are sorry about your sin, and you turn from your sin, and you turn towards God. That's the basic definition of repentance. And by responsibility means He wants us to stop blaming other people for our sin and own it, just be responsible. This is all we have to do. If you really want to experience restoration from God, get right with Him and that comes by repentance and taking responsibility for what we do. They go hand in hand.
I have surely heard Ephraim’s moaning: ‘You disciplined me like an unruly calf, and I have been disciplined. Restore me, and I will return, because you are the Lord my God. 19 After I strayed, I repented; after I came to understand, I beat my breast. I was ashamed and humiliated because I bore the disgrace of my youth. - Jeremiah 31:18-19
You disciplined me like an unruly calf. They're saying this to the Lord, you disciplined me. I was like an unruly calf. I was kicking. I was screaming, I was rebellious, and I have been disciplined, restore me. The word restoration means I will return because you are the Lord my God and then it says after I strayed, I repented. The ESV says relented. but repent is the idea of turning from sin and turning to God. I repented after I came to understand. I beat my breast. I was ashamed and humiliated because I bore the disgrace of my youth.
The idea is I felt the sorrow and pain of my sin against you, God. I felt convicted about it. I felt sad about it. I repent of my sin. I'm sorry for my sin and I turned towards you. That's the idea of repentance and this is what God wants. They're only going to be restored, we're only going to be restored if we get right with God through repentance. We have to repent; we have to leave our life of sin and turn toward God. “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord” - Acts 3:19. Repent and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out and that times of refreshing may come from the Lord. This wonderful refreshing comes from God. When we repent, we get a clean heart with God. There's nothing quite better than that, it's just an amazing refreshing clean feeling that we have with the Lord. The second idea of responsibility is found a little further in the chapter 31:27 to 30. “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, that I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man and the seed of beast. And it shall come to pass, that as I have watched over them to pluck up, to break down, to throw down, to destroy, and to afflict, so I will watch over them to build and to plant, says the Lord. -Jeremiah 31:27-28. This is the restoration. But he says this verse 29 “In those days they shall say no more: ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, And the children’s teeth are set on edge.’ 30 But everyone shall die for his own iniquity; every man who eats the sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge.”
Another way of saying it is my parents have eaten something sour and so I experienced the tartness of it. The meaning is that my parents did something. The result was that I felt the consequences because my parents really are to blame for the sour taste in my mouth. God says stop blaming your mom and dad for that. It's time you own your own sin, that the soul who sins will die. Just stop going around saying well my parents ate sour grapes so you know that's why I do what I do. Stop saying that I want everybody to own up to his own sin and stop blaming other people. People are blaming everybody and everything. If you really want to experience restoration in your own life you can't go around saying, well that's just the way I am. If you really understand what a relationship with Christ is, it begins when you are born again and Jesus Christ comes into your life regardless of how you may have been shaped growing up, God reshapes you and makes all things new. God takes your life and in the process of the miracle of restoration takes the old grimy self that you used to be and makes you new in Christ. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. - 2 Corinthians 5:17. We can stop blaming other people, we can recognize ourselves of our new identity in Christ. Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he or she is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come. Amen.
